#Proto-evangelical

[apollos-olives]

Palestinians literally have so much similarities with the Jews. Down to the genetics. Jesus was literally a Palestinian, even if when he was born it wasn’t called Palestine. They say that the Palestinians are the phillistines, but modern Palestinians have extremely little to no phillistine ancestry. The biblical Philistines were the so-called “sea people”.Their presence in what is now Israel is usually dated to 1150 BCE.The best guess is that they were part of the proto-Greek Minoan-Mycenian civilization.

So Christians who claim that Palestinians are the “Phillistine enemies of Israel” are so… stupid.

The perversion of Christianity by the west is absolutely disgusting. They cheer on the deaths of the “chosen people” (biblically, Jesus’ people are God’s chosen people) and they cheer on the deaths of not only innocents, but Palestinian Christians as well!

that's just how dangerous evangelical christianity is. evangelicals are inherently irrational and so are many of their arguments, because they don't understand shit or even know the history outside their colonized view of it. that's what makes them so dangerous, and why we need to completely dismantle the west, because evangelicals are too deeply rooted in the system.

[wishesofeternity]

“An assessment of Anne (Boleyn) and the Reformation must commence with an evaluation of her own religious views. Unlike Henry’s sixth wife, Katherine Parr, Anne wrote no religious works, so we lack much direct evidence from which to assess her convictions. We instead rely on the assertions of others and what can be surmised from her behaviour and belongings. It is nonetheless clear that Anne was by no means a kind of proto-protestant. For instance, when Thomas Revell tried to present her with his translation of François Lambert’s radical Farrago Rerum Theologicarum—which included scepticism about the real presence of Christ in the eucharist, and detailed the socially disruptive implications of the priesthood of all believers—she declined his request, saying “she would not trouble herself” with the book. Likewise, Anne’s comments during her imprisonment imply that—at least during this difficult period—she maintained many orthodox views. Sir William Kingston, constable of the Tower, wrote to Cromwell that she spoke of retiring to a nunnery; that she asked whether she would go to heaven, for she had “done mony gud dedys in my days”; and that she “meche desyred to have here in the closet the sacrament,” suggesting that she held traditional views on transubstantiation, the issue which Henry saw as the test of sound belief.

There remains much evidence, however, that Anne had evangelical sympathies. For example, Cranmer, who knew the Queen well, noted the “love which I judged her to bear towards God and his gospel,” when writing to Henry following her arrest in May 1536, and Richard Hilles lamented her loss in 1541 as one of the “sincere ministers of the word” who had been taken away. Yet, perhaps the most telling evidence of Anne’s personal piety comes from the books that she owned. These included a copy of William Tyndale’s 1534 edition of the New Testament, which was banned and considered to be a heretical work, and a part copy, part English translation, of Jacques Lefèvre d’Étaples’s Epistres et Evangiles, a work condemned by the Sorbonne for its potential Lutheran echoes. Thus, while Anne cannot be described as a ‘protestant’—a term that did not become naturalised in England until after 1553—she seems to have been genuinely interested in religious reform and evangelical issues.

Anne’s impact on the Reformation is most obvious with Henry’s break from Rome. This was recognised in Anne’s own lifetime; when told that there was no pope, but only a bishop of Rome, one Henry Kylbie replied that “this business had never been if the Kinge had not maryed Anne Bullen.” Although it was Henry’s desire to annul his first marriage to marry Anne that caused conflict with the papacy, the Boleyns provided more than a spark for this clash. They offered patronage to academics who worked on the campaign for Henry’s annulment, including Thomas Cranmer, the future Archbishop of Canterbury, and Edward Fox, the future Bishop of Hereford; they took a keen interest in the progress of Henry’s “Great Matter”; and they seemingly furnished Henry with evangelical literature, with Anne reportedly introducing him to both Simon Fish’s virulently anticlerical Supplication for the Beggars and Tyndale’s Obedience of the Christian Man, which argued that papal claims to independent power were bogus and unscriptural. While the contribution these works made to the elaboration of the royal supremacy has been doubted, they may well have helped, and can hardly have hindered matters. In these ways, Anne and her family played an important part in encouraging the rejection of papal authority and achieving Henry’s Break from Rome, a fundamental element of the English Reformation.

Anne also facilitated religious reform by furthering the careers of evangelicals. Writing to Elizabeth I in 1559, Alexander Ales hailed “the evangelical bishops whom your most holy mother had appointed from among those schoolmasters who favoured the purer doctrine of the Gospel.” Who were these bishops? While William Latymer asserted that her influence lay behind the promotion of Thomas Cranmer to Canterbury, Hugh Latimer to the bishopric of Worcester, Nicholas Shaxton to Salisbury, Thomas Goodrich to Ely, and John Skip to Hereford, the evidence is clearest in the cases of Latimer and Shaxton, who Foxe also thought she “placed” and “preferred” to their sees. Although Anne certainly did not ‘appoint’ Latimer and Shaxton to their dioceses, she undoubtedly assisted them, lending each £200 to pay their first fruits to the King after their elevations, and their preferment was plausibly due to what Latymer described as her “continuall mediacione.” Anne herself recognised her links to these bishops, speaking in the Tower of “my bysshoppys.” Her part in the promotion of these men to the episcopal bench was important, for it meant they could wield the power of episcopal office to promote fellow evangelicals, pursue reform in their dioceses, and frustrate the efforts of their opponents.

Anne also influenced lesser clerical appointments. She employed a series of evangelical clergy as her chaplains, including Latimer and Matthew Parker. She also sought appointments for her favoured clergymen elsewhere, and was prepared to pressure them into taking them up and making the most of them, as in May 1535, when she addressed Edward Crome concerning the parsonage of St Mary Aldermary in London, which she had “obtained for him.” She exhorted him to make “no farther delays in this matter, but to take on … the cure and charge of the said benefice,” for she desired “the furtherance of virtue, truth, and godly doctrine, which we trust shall not be a little increased, and right much the better advanced and established, by your better relief and residence there.” The indefatigable commitment that some of the clergy she appointed showed to driving reform at a local level is clear in the case of William Barlow, who she made prior of Haverfordwest in 1534. From his position, Barlow “endeveryd … with no smalle bodely daunger agenst Antichrist, and all his confederat adherentes, sincerely to preche the gospell of Christ,” arousing much hostility from the local clergy. Anne’s promotion of such clerics was significant. Not only did men like Barlow show great zeal in fighting for reform within their spheres of influence, but her promotion of men as her chaplains also proved an important step in the careers of individuals like Latimer, who became Bishop of Worcester in 1535, and Parker, who became Elizabeth I’s frist Archbishop of Canterbury in 1559. This was attested by Parker himself, who wrote to William Cecil, Lord Burghley, in 1572, professing that “if I had not been so much bound to the mother [Anne], I would not so soon have granted to serve the daughter [Elizabeth] in this place.’

While previous queens had often interceded for those facing punishment, Anne used her intercessory role in to protect those interested in reform. For instance, in 1528 she wrote to Cardinal Wolsey, beseeching him “to remember the parson of Honey Lane for my sake.” This was a reference to either Thomas Forman (rector of All Hallows, Honey Lane) or Thomas Garrett (curate of the same church), who were both implicated in the trade of evangelical books. Likewise, in May 1534, she wrote to Cromwell asking for Richard Herman, one of the principal promoters and financial sponsors of Tyndale’s New Testament, to be restored to his position, after hearing that he had been expelled from his “fredome and felowshipe of and in the Englishe house” of Antwerp, because he helped “the settyng forthe of the Newe Testamente in Englisshe.” Anne may have acquired a reputation for lending aid in such matters, which might explain why Thomas Alwaye sought to petition her in 1530 when imprisoned for his involvement in buying English New Testaments and other prohibited books. While the evidence is not certain, Anne’s patronage potentially had longer-lasting repercussions, as individuals like Thomas Garrett later became troublesome evangelical preachers.

Anne was thus clearly an important figure in the early stages of evangelical reform in England. She was by no means an omnipotent proto-protestant—that evangelicals like Thomas Bilney and John Frith were burnt between 1531 and 1533 reveals limits to either her beliefs or her infuence. Yet, individuals did not need to be all-powerful to encourage religious change: Thomas Cranmer’s failure to prevent the passage of the Six Articles in 1539 did not hinder his influence in the ecclesiastical politics of the early Tudor period. Nor did they have to be fully fledged evangelicals to have sped the course of reform. That Henry VIII himself published Assertio Septem Sacramentorum in 1521 (a rebuttal of Martin Luther’s anti-papal De Captivitate Babylonica), remained devoted throughout his life to the Blessed Sacrament, and consistently rejected the teachings of Luther and Huldrych Zwingli does not invalidate his centrality to the reforms of his reign. Moreover, Anne’s infuence on reform need not be at the expense of others. The course of religious change in sixteenth-century England was not simply shaped by monarchs, devout conservatives like John Fisher, or devout evangelicals like William Latimer, but also by many who lay between these extremes, like Stephen Gardiner, who argued for Henry’s divorce and accepted the Dissolution of the Monasteries, but fercely defended transubstantiation. Anne—as a promoter, defender, and supporter of evangelicals, who played a significant part in instigating the Break from Rome—was one of the most important of these individuals.

- Chloe Fairbanks and Samuel Lane, “Anne Boleyn: Traditionalist and Reformer” in “Tudor and Stuart Consorts: Power, Influence and Dynasty”

[will-o-the-witch]

i made an offhand joke the other day about introducing divine feminine to protestant evangelical ecosystems to see what kind of new, more interesting brainworms it would produce. it wasnt serious but i mentioned Asherah being described in some pre-monotheistic israelite texts as G-ds spouse as a basis.

later i wondered if maybe that wasnt a similar vein as Lilith vis-a-vis appropriation, said "yikes hope no ones doing that after all" to myself and then off course found a reference (in an already otherwise terrible occult book) to modern "Lady Asherah" worship.

i so im interested on your take. on the one hand she's explicitly described as a canaanite false god in the text, on the other she is historically more closely related to Judaism than pretty much any other modern religion? i suppose the same question would apply to other mentioned canaanite gods like Ba'al but Asherah seems most likely to get swooped up by newbie witches

Oh people 1000% already unironically do that lol

I personally have no problem with people doing anything Canaanite deity-related if they're actually, you know, doing the Canaanite thing and not trying to retcon in the specifically Jewish stuff lol. Some people get weird about it because they're fixated entirely on the proto-Abrahamic aspect, but then other folks are just perfectly fine regular Pagan types

[mehilaiselokuva]

Word list: religion part 1, christianity

(I'm reading for my finals. I'm doing an exam on religion, so I thought why not make this post about some religion-related vocab.)

Jumala - God Evankelis-luterilainen - Evangelical Lutheran Uskontokunta, uskonto - religion Helluntailainen - Pentecostal Synkretismi - syncretism Kantauralilainen - proto-uralic Pyhä - holy Sielu - soul Pappi - priest Tuonpuoleinen - otherworldly, afterlife Ortodoksinen - Orthodox Kristillinen - christian (or related to christianity) Kirkko - church Arkkipiispa - archbishop Katolilainen - Catholic Kardinaali - cardinal Piispa - bishop Käännynnäinen - a convert Jumalanpelko - the fear of God Jumalanpalvelus - service, worship Rippi - confession, confirmation, communion Uskonnonvapaus - freedom of religion Lähetystyö - mission (going abroad)

[astropithecus]

So, an interesting fact about me, I'm an agnostic with a degree in Biblical Studies from an evangelical megachurch diploma mill - I was going to school to be a pastor.

I spent a non-trivial amount of time with ancient Hebrew and Greek lexicons, reading the books of the Bible in their original languages. I did a lot of extracurricular study on the ecumenical councils - the bishops that voted on which books were going to be "the Bible" initially at the behest of the Roman emperor Constantine. I read a lot of the Gnostic texts that contributed to early Christian philosophy but were declared heretical a few hundred years after they were written.

The conclusion I came to was that if there were ever any spiritual truths in the texts that make up the Bible, they would've undoubtedly been obscured during Christianity's time as the official religion of the Roman Empire, if not excised entirely. Even just the fact that Christianity was the official religion of Rome often comes as a surprise to Evangelical Christians - they tend to be indoctrinated with a narrative that the Romans targeted Christians for persecution, they see Christians being thrown to lions as the representative image of Christianity in Ancient Rome. In reality, Roman historians are the ones that created that narrative in the first place, hundreds of years after the fact. The relationship between Rome and Christianity was complicated. For a couple of centuries, there was some scattered persecution, generally not targeted at Christians specifically. Ultimately, however, the Empire's attitude toward Christianity became essentially "if you can't beat them, join them."

The Roman Empire had need of an official religion and a holy text that reflected its values - xenophobia, patriarchy, slavery, expansionism - and the ecumenical councils provided it. People point out the hypocrisy of modern-day evangelicals for saying "God is love" but then hating women and minorities, but that is the religion of the Roman Empire, alive and well in 2023. It's a stretch to call the Roman Empire "fascist" (the word didn't exist yet), but the word fascism comes from Fasces, the symbol of Roman imperial magistrates. It is no coincidence that the more literally you interpret the Bible, the more comfortable you become with a nationalist Christian theocracy, as the Bible was assembled by the ecumenical councils to be a cultural assimilation handbook for new, recently-conquered subjects of the Roman Empire - the world's first "Christian nation." Modern-day Christians promote the idea that people are "twisting" the Bible to support hatred, bigotry, and oppression, but they're ignoring there was a period of several hundred years where anything that questioned the absolute racial and cultural supremacy of the Roman Empire and it's natural-born citizens was declared "heresy" and struck from the canon. It's a text whose primary purpose is to provide spiritual justification for conquering and subjugating people.

That means White Christian Nationalists aren't "misinterpreting" the Bible, they're using it exactly the way the Roman Empire intended it to be used. To codify and legitimize a caste system where native-born male citizens occupy the highest strata, and political leaders are the arbiters of God's will. It took a lot of re-writing to take the "proto-communist" teachings of the early Christian church and turn it into that Bible, but that's probably why most of what became known as "the New Testament" was written by Roman citizens, well after after Jesus' death. Fun fact: Saul of Tarsus - author of the Pauline epistles, otherwise known as "two-thirds of the New Testament" - was a natural-born Roman citizen that never met Jesus. As if that wasn't a tenuous enough connection, about half of the Pauline epistles are probably falsely attributed. We don't really know who wrote them, when, or why.

Once you recognize the bias, it is glaring. The Bible paints patriarchy as such a fundamental force of nature that salvation itself is an "inheritance" you have to become "joint heirs with Christ" (the Son of God) to receive. It says anyone violent or debased enough to seize power is "appointed by God" - a step further than even "might makes right," this says "might makes you the literal mouthpiece of God on Earth." If I'm being honest, at this point it wouldn't matter if the Bible were the infallible "Word of God" or not - if this is "God" talking, I wouldn't worship him just based on principle.

But it puts Christians in a difficult spot. You either have to concede that the Bible is fallible (which is heresy, according to evangelicals) or that God really does hate women, foreigners, democracy, and social equality. If a divine force "guided" the decisions of the ecumenical councils it would mean God endorses slavery, government authoritarianism, and racial supremacy. On the other hand, if there was no divine influence, then the entire Christian canon is essentially fanfic, philosophy cherry-picked by Romans to not be at odds with their own imperialist values. Either way, it's not representative of ideals I could dedicate my life to. I left the church before my ordination.

Before my mother passed, dismayed for my eternal soul, she used to tell me she prayed Proverbs 22:6 over me often - "Train up a child in the way he should go: And when he is old, he will not depart from it." Christians regard this scripture as a promise that if they raise their children to know God, they won't be led astray as adults. I wonder sometimes if she got what she prayed for, but in a different way than she expected. She raised me to know a God of love, of peace, with a heart of justice and understanding (which means tolerance, by the way - it's the ancient Hebrew word shâmaʻ which means to hear, and understand. When King Solomon prayed for "understanding" to lead his people, he was asking for the ability to hear and relate to people different than himself. That's what scriptural 'wisdom' is - empathy and compassion - you know, the things Evangelical Christians call 'woke' now). Because of it, now that I'm 'old', I can't be led astray by the callous Roman imperialist god of the Bible or the new capitalist American prosperity Jesus that didn't really mean what he said with "sell all you have and give to the poor."

Seems a little arrogant, doesn't it? Maybe even offensive. "I know the truth, everyone else is wrong." Who do I think I am? But since I exist, now old and still well-"departed" from the modern Christian church, the only alternative explanations are a) Proverbs 22:6 isn't actually a promise from God despite what the majority of western Christians believe, b) God doesn't keep his promises or, c) nobody is listening to prayers from little old church ladies and this whole 'god' thing is just ascribing anthropomorphic motivations to the forces of coincidence and random chance in the first place. As an agnostic, I don't really have any skin in that game, so feel free to pick whichever explanation sits best with you. Just remember, if you ever ask yourself "what would Jesus do?" - the answer might include flipping over tables in a church bookstore and chasing church-goers with a bullwhip.

[atheistcartoons]

There is something in the heart of many religious people which craves submission. They are desperate for someone to be in charge, to tell them what to do. Maybe this is why the ultimate power-weirdo form of government, fascism, is often rooted in religious communities.

Trump’s proto-fascist power base was evangelical Christians who behaved at his rallies in a manner indistinguishable to how they behave in their mega-churches. Hitler’s power base was Roman Catholics (ripe for fascism because they not only crave supernatural authority but also believe that a very earthly hierarchy of priests, bishops and a pope are qualified to tell them what to believe).

Religious people will claim that their religion empowers them but of course it does the exact opposite. It puts them in the thrall of an unknowable authority they must obey. And they believe that kneeling before him sets them free: Gehorsam macht frei.

The word Islam literally means “submission” so again my appreciation goes to Muslims who are at least up-front about their disordered relationship with authority. 

Some of us just can’t live like that. Some of us do not yearn to be told what to do and how to feel. Some of us want to decide how we feel about things on our own. Some of us want to be in control of ourselves. Some of us reserve the right to question and criticise anyone who wants to tell us what to do or think or feel.

Some of us are atheists.

[thecreaturecodex]

What mythical creatures live in Miami

Skunk apes! The skunk ape is a regional variation of Bigfoot. Smaller, smellier, meaner. They are reported from throughout the South, but central and southern Florida are definitely Home Base for the skunk apes. The photo was allegedly taken at Myakka River State Park

Image © Gustavo Rinaldi, accessed at ArtStation here

There's a famous bit of writing called "Myths over Miami", which reports on the emergent mythology of homeless children in Miami. In this mythos, Bloody Mary, somewhat merged with La Llorona, is the primary architect of evil in the world. The story is almost certainly a hoax, as it has never been corroborated or even followed up on, but it's still a good read.

There's a fair number of monster movies set in and filmed in Florida, but most of them are farther north. Sting of Death (1965) (above) is a proto-slasher movie in which the villain is a mad science created were-jellyfish who hangs out in the Everglades. And Blood Freak (1972) (below), shot and set in Miami, is an evangelical Christian horror movie. The titular freak is a blood drinking, drug addled turkey-man, created through a drug interaction between experimental growth hormones in turkey meat and a laced joint. Except that it's all just a dream, enabling both him and the bad girl giving him the drugs to repent and find Jesus!

[sonyclasica]

SHIRO SAGISU

EVANGELION INFINITY Y EVANGELION-VOX

Milan Records lanza  dos álbumes con la música de la popular franquicia de anime NEON GENESIS EVANGELION del compositor Shiro SAGISU. Disponibles por primera vez fuera de Japón, ambos álbumes incluyen música de la serie original de anime de 1995 de Hideaki Anno, así como de la serie de películas REBUILD OF EVANGELION, que concluyó en 2021 con el lanzamiento de la cuarta y última película de la serie Evangelion: 3.0+1.0 Thrice Upon a Time.

Escucha Evangelion Infinity AQUÍ

Escucha Evangelion-Vox AQUÍ

EVANGELION INFINITY llega como un enorme álbum recopilatorio de 50 pistas compuesto por múltiples versiones del icónico tema "EM20" de SAGISU, recién reinterpretado en una gama de estilos que incluyen desde versiones a capella y spaghetti western hasta chiptune del tema -escúchalo aquí. EVANGELION-VOX, por su parte, incluye 20 remakes de hip-hop y R&B de la música de SAGISU, con aportaciones de artistas como MALI, LOREN&MASH, LOREN y otros más que dan un giro a algunos de los temas principales de la serie – ecúchalo aquí.

EVANGELION INFINITY

TRACKLISTING –

1.       DECISIVE BATTLE (1995)

2.       Spending Time in Preparation (1996)

3.       The Beast Ⅱ(1996)

4.       NORMAL BLOOD (1996)

5.       The Longest Day (2007)

6.       The Longest Day Ⅱ(2007)

7.       EM10B Rhythm Main Mix 070820 (shin)

8.       The Longest Day Ⅲ (2007)

9.       Strategie"Yashima" (2007)

10.    Battaille Decisive (2007)

11.    Sin From Genesis (2009)

12.    2EM36 rhythm only (shin)

13.    2EM36 orchestra only (shin)

14.    Bataille d'Espace (2012)

15.    Serenity Amongst the Turmoil (2012)

16.    E01_matsumoto (2013)

17.    E16_shima (2013)

18.    euro nerv (2021)

19.    EM10A alterne (2021)

20.    EM10A alterne bis (2021)

21.    EM20 =wunder operation= (2021)

22.    E-16 normal rhythm (1998)

23.    E-16 fast rhythm only (1998)

24.    PRELUDE TO BATTLE (1997) – MALI

25.    BATTLING (1997) – MALI

26.    E01_EWS_Amano&Kosei (2009)

27.    E01_01_YoichiMurata_Session (2009)

28.    E01_02_YoichiMurata_Session (2009)

29.    Jerry Long (2016)

30.    Akira Jimbo universe (shin)

31.    ch alt1 proto (shin)

32.    ch alt3 proto (shin)

33.    ch alt4 proto (shin)

34.    EM20_alterna01～EM20_alterna03～EM20_alterna04(2017)

35.    E01_WithoutEricTrumpet_EWS_Amano&Kosei (2009)

36.    Shiro'sBrassBand_TributeToBreckerBrothers (2009)

37.    EM20 KOTETSU Voice Orchestra (shin)

38.    TENSIONS featuring Takahashi Yoko (2017) – Yoko Takahashi

39.    TENSIONS =he who pays the piper= (2017) – Yoko Takahashi

40.    EM20 =clint eastwood= (shin)

41.    euro nerv optionA =tokyo III and timpani= (shin)

42.    EM20 =spaghetti western swang= (shin)

43.    euro nerv optionB =tokyo III and guitars= (shin)

44.    Can’t run away, Face it =EVA oriented Giant Swing= (shin)

45.    EM20 =super chiptune= (shin)

46.    alterna blueprint CHOKKAKU guitars (shin)

47.    a short attention span (shin)

48.    battle suite 1997 (1997)

49.    EM20 suite 2017 (2017)

50.    all you need is love, Martin… (shin)

EVANGELION-VOX

TRACKLISTING –

“EVANTRODUCTION” (A-4) – The LORD

“THE IMAGE OF ME –vocalise” (A-1) – LOREN

“FROM MY DREAMS” (A-4) – Carroll Thompson

“EVANGELISM” (A-4)– LONDON GOSPEL CHOIR

“CAN'T GET YOU OUTTA MY HEAD” (A-4) – LOREN&MASH

“X-plicit” – MALI

“PRELUDE TO BATTLE” (E-1) – MALI

“BATTLING” (E-1)  – MALI

“interlude-THANATOS” (E-13)  – Mike Wyzgowski, LOREN

“THANATOS-IF I CAN'T BE YOURS- JAZZ SIDE STRICK-MIX ” (E-13)– LOREN&MASH

“I'LL BE ALWAYS ON YOUR MIND” (C-5) – Carroll Thompson

“ARMAGEDDON” – MALI

“Komm,susser Tod” TUMBLING DOWN-MIX (M-10) – LOREN&MASH

“ANGEL ATTACK” (E-6) – MALI

“UTOPIA “– MALI

“PROMISED LAND-reprise” (F-2) – Camelle Hinds

“PROMISED LAND LOREN & MASH studio LIVE” (F-2) – LOREN&MASH

“STAR” (LOREN & MASH studio LIVE)(F-2) – LOREN&MASH

“THE IMAGE OF ME” playback (A-1) – LOREN

OUTRO “never shall we return from conflict we must learn” (A-10) - The LORD

SOBRE Shiro SAGISU

Nacido en Tokio en 1957, Shiro SAGISU es un compositor, arreglista y productor musical que ha estado en la vanguardia de la industria musical durante casi 40 años, desde su participación en el debut de The Square en un gran sello discográfico en 1978. Ha trabajado en cientos de miles de canciones con artistas de una amplia gama de géneros, desde la era de la canción idol de principios de los 80 hasta el reciente J-Pop y el crossover clásico, y también ha participado activamente en el campo del cine, la televisión y otros tipos de música visual. Además, produce constantemente un gran número de proyectos de éxito. Ha estado activo en Europa desde los años 90, dirigiendo clubes en París y componiendo música para artistas británicos y franceses. También fue el primer compositor japonés en dirigir la música de una película coreana. Su combinación con Hideaki Anno, que ha durado más de un cuarto de siglo, tiene muchos fans entusiastas en todo el mundo. Además, siguiendo los pasos de su padre, Soji Ushio (1921-2004), dirige Pee Productions y gestiona las producciones de la empresa. Entre sus trabajos más recientes figuran las series EVANGELION, MUSA, CASSHERN, BLEACH, Berserk, Shingeki no Kyojin (ATTACK ON TITAN) y Shin Godzilla. Actualmente desarrolla su actividad internacional con tres bases en Londres, París y Tokio.

Sony Music Masterworks se compone de los sellos Masterworks, Sony Classical, Milan Records, XXIM Records y Masterworks Broadway. Para obtener información y actualizaciones por correo electrónico, visita https://lnk.to/sonysoundtracks.

CONECTA CON MILAN RECORDS: WEBSITE | FACEBOOK | INSTAGRAM | TWITTER | YOUTUBE

[adultswim2021]

Soul Quest Overdrive #1: “Pilot” | ca. February 21, 2010 (online) | S00E01

Yet another failed pilot from our friends at Adult Swim (sponsored by Burger King). This one is the somewhat ballyhooed spin-off of the Aqua Teen Hunger Force episode “Bible Fruit”. Bert Banana, Tammy Tangerine, and Mortimer Mango are now just Bert, Tammy, and Mortimer. Instead of being fruit, they are now sports equipment, with Bert being a bowling pin, Tammy being a basketball, and Mortimer being a flesh light carrying-case. The animation is also totally different. But the voices are still the same; they even get to use their real names in the credits (on THIS?!).

The dynamic is roughly the same, too, with them being mostly horrible people, and Bert being mostly the worst. In this pilot episode, Bert runs the RV off a cliff and it lands on a guy, who suffers tremendously while they waffle on how to help. They throw away his car jack because it’s made of science and not god. Bert smokes PCP to lift the car but instead hallucinates that Jesus Christ (voiced by Paul Reubens), has rolled up in an American-flag patterned tank. Jesus seduces Bert but then transforms into a tiger. In the non-hallucinatory reality, Bert is just in a dumpster freaking out. The guy pinned under the car uses his car keys to saw off his top half to crawl away, but is picked up by a bird of prey. The end. 

Another notable thing about the show is that it’s actually less than half as long as a typical 11-minute Adult Swim show; presumably they were going to air two installments in each 11 minute slot. When four episodes of this aired back-to-back-to-back-to-back it filled a 30 minute time slot with commercials. I vaguely recall conversations at this time about Adult Swim experimenting with making their programming even shorter, with things like this coming out of it. In general, a lot of people liked to make a lotta hay about how attention spans were getting shorter, so short-form entertainment needed to become even more short-form. I guess this sorta thing presaged their “Smalls” program of programs. 

At the time this was too hard of a concept to comprehend, because back then TV was made out of a grid in your cable box with the schedule displayed in oblong boxes, and the idea of quarter-hour shows was already too weird for words. It just didn't look right in those oblong boxes. Like, too short to even display the title. How could one even dream of changing the scale of the traditional 90-minute-wide cable guide schedule matrix??

The most notable thing about this show is that it FUUUUUCKING SUUUUUUUUUUCKS. Honestly, this is some proto-Mr.-Pickles bullshit. I once watched season six of Saturday Night Live, because I wanted to see just how bad it was. It was bad, but more capable than I was expecting. But the thing that irked me about that version of SNL was that it just seemed like it was joylessly ticking off boxes to prove itself as being worthy to succeed the original cast SNL. See? We did a drug joke! See, we did a joke about evangelicals!

Soul Quest Overdrive does this but for Adult Swim's pre-existing programming. See? We had a character do PCP and get gay with jingoistic Jesus! See, we had a guy with his intestines hanging out and the main characters were mean to him! See! The animation is ugly-ass on purpose! See! There's rebellious-sounding thrash metal in there! The show is ostensibly satire, but it feels like a masquerade. The whole thing is so repugnant that it’s impossible to see what seems like the shallowest observations about religion being gay or whatever. I mean, not gay, but bad. Sorry, everyone for calling this show “gay” like that. I’m simply as god made me. 

But worst of all, they forgot to be funny.

Written by Nick Ingkatanuwat and John Brestan and allegedly Matt Maiellaro and Dave Willis; I wonder if they actually wrote this or not and if their credit has to do with coming up with the characters. That whole thing of the show being reskinned seems oddly suspicious to me, and not just a creative choice. It seems like it would’ve made all the sense in the world to just have the original bible fruit star in a show. Anybody know what up with that? Do you think they did the redesign as an attempt but failed, and it was just too late by then?

I’ve touched on the Burger King-sponsored pilot contest that this sprang out of. That contest had a penchant for switching up the actual pilots; substituting one version of the pilot for a new version without really announcing it. This is the first episode to drop on the website, and is different from “Meals on Wheels”, which seems to have meant to be the “pilot” they were officially “competing” with.

I assume what happened was they already made a small order of episodes of this, so it was never really truly competing anyway. Maybe they assumed it would win in the voting. I simply do not know. Anyway, the date I gave is the earliest date I could find where it sprung up on my piracy website by choice. I believe the uploaders there were passionate enough about Adult Swim that their uploads are pretty accurate or as close to an official air-date as you can find. 

Soul Quest Overdrive would eventually air all the episodes on television at 4AM one night. This episode never did resurface until I think somebody connected with the production posted it on vimeo or something. My viewing copy of this was pretty decent-looking. I’m not sure it was in HD, but it still looked better than it deserved to.

[thenewdeadseascrolls]

Judges 2: 6-15. "North of the Storm."

There is a theme and variations that runs through the Tanakh and also human history. Things get better, then they lapse once again. It is safe to say as we enter the cusp of World War III human beings do know how to govern themselves they just do not entirely wish to do so for very long.

Persons who do not want to get with the program are called Philistines, "tunnelers." Philistines include Mormons, Evangelicals, Republicans, fundamentalist Muslims, the persons occupying the Kremlin, North Korea, much of Africa, and around 55% of America if you view the current polls.

Tunnelers tunnel under the Law and the laws, using all kinds of freaky spooky stories to explain the rationale for their errant and misanthropic behavior. They disguise their intentions behind odd phrases, bizarre theories using these to cover politicians in purple cloaks. Then they murder, rape, steal, and lie their way through our lives right at their sides.

The Torah and its most important spokesperson, the Christ said none of these apply. There is One Spirit and its spirit must permeate the activities of the government. The government must reflect the will of God as surely as if it were a churchgoing entity itself.

When an asshole or a group of them rise up and deign to turn the government against the people and the Spirit of God, they must be torn down and destroyed. This is also the essence of the Law, called Joshua, son of Nun, "Salvation is the son of Posterity."

Disobedience and Defeat

6 After Joshua had dismissed the Israelites, they went to take possession of the land, each to their own inheritance. 7 The people served the Lord throughout the lifetime of Joshua and of the elders who outlived him and who had seen all the great things the Lord had done for Israel.

8 Joshua son of Nun, the servant of the Lord, died at the age of a hundred and ten. 9 And they buried him in the land of his inheritance, at Timnath Heres[b] in the hill country of Ephraim, north of Mount Gaash.

10 After that whole generation had been gathered to their ancestors, another generation grew up who knew neither the Lord nor what he had done for Israel. 

11 Then the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord and served the Baals. 12 They forsook the Lord, the God of their ancestors, who had brought them out of Egypt. They followed and worshiped various gods of the peoples around them. They aroused the Lord’s anger 

13 because they forsook him and served Baal and the Ashtoreths. 14 In his anger against Israel the Lord gave them into the hands of raiders who plundered them. He sold them into the hands of their enemies all around, whom they were no longer able to resist. 

15 Whenever Israel went out to fight, the hand of the Lord was against them to defeat them, just as he had sworn to them. They were in great distress.

The strange terms first:

Joshua=to cry out for independent economic freedom

he verb ישע (yasha') means to be unrestricted and thus to be free and thus to be saved (from restriction, from oppression and thus from ultimate demise). A doer of this verb is a savior.

Nouns ישועה (yeshua), ישע (yesha') and תשועה (teshua) mean salvation. Adjective שוע (shoa') means (financially) independent, freed in an economic sense.

Verb שוע (shawa') means to cry out (for salvation). Nouns שוע (shua'), שוע (shoa') and שועה (shawa) mean a cry (for salvation).

Nun= Posterity, Fish

Timnath Heres= Discrimination, to become an agent of the Sun

The interrogative pronoun מן (man) means "what?" but the preposition מן (min) means "out of" or "from". The latter is often deployed as prefix, in which only the מ (m) is written. Nouns formed from "מ plus root" commonly describe an "agent" or "place-of" whatever the action of the root describes.

The core function of these words is to distinguish an entity from its environment: hence to distinguish. In Proto-Indo-European appears a strikingly similar root, namely men-, from which we get words like mnemonic and mind (and money).

Verb מנה (mana) means to count or assign or partition (to demarcate a thing from where it emerged from). Nouns מנה (mana) and מנת (menat) mean portion or part. Noun מנה (maneh) is a unit of weight; the mina. And noun מנה (moneh) means time (not clock time but as in ten "times").

Ephraim=The temple of fruitful learning, "bulls in a stable."

The verb פרר (parar) means to split, divide and usually make more, expand or multiply. This root belongs to an extended family that also contains פרץ (paras), to break (through), פרש (paras and parash), to spread out or declare, פרס (paras), to break in two or divide, and פאר (pa'ar) means to branch out or to glorify.

The Bible is not concerned with political goings on and only with the evolution of the wisdom tradition, and thus with the rise of information technology (from cave paintings to blockchain). That said: our word "science" comes from the Greek verb σξιζω (schizo), which means to split, divide and make more.

Verb פרה (para) means to bear fruit or be fruitful. Noun פרי (peri) means fruit in its broadest sense. Noun פר (par) means young bull and פרה (para) means young heifer. Note that the first letter א (aleph) is believed to denote an ox-head, while its name derives from the verb אלף (aleph), to learn or to produce thousands.

The second letter, ב (beth) is also the word for house (or temple or stable). The familiar word "alphabet," therefore literally means "stable of bulls" or "house of divisions" or "temple of fruitful learning".

Mount Gaash= "the eruption, the quaking, storm."

The Angels love to talk about themselves like they are the equivalent in power to natural disasters. The greatest of these takes place after the introduction of the alphabet, reading, writing, and arethmatic to manking. He surely does not know how to handle himself one way or the other.

To go North of the Storm into the Eye of the Sun, Timnath-Serah is what they really want us to do but most of the time we stop short and choose to become hemorrhoids within each others' rectume holes instead.

Baal=a god on the ground. Bad, very bad.

Egypt=Temple of Pitah. the Confederacy. A place of profanity and pain.

Ashtoreths= Unity of Instructions. Notice the term contains "torah" but an Ashtoreth is not quite a Torah.

The verb עשת ('ashat) probably describes the process of how loose elements contract and become a smooth, solid union: to be or become cohesive.

Noun עשת ('eshet) appears to describe a "solid" or "cohesive" body part, possibly the sexual organs. Adjective עשות ('ashot) means smooth in the sense of uncontaminated (of iron).

Nouns עשתות ('ashtut) and עשתון ('eshtona) describe a mental function, and particularly a consistency of thought or consciousness.

Noun עשתי ('ashte) means one.

We must not stop short of the objective, called Mashiach, "global ethical responsibility". For Mashiach to work, every human being needs to educated, treated well and governed fairly and with robust economics. There mustn't ever be a shortage, stoppage, inflation, wars, violence, disruptions, or freaks or weird people running for office, suggesting we follow an Ashtoreth instead of the Guide to success.

The Values in Gematria are:

v. 6-7: They went to take possession of the land. Land is for now, it is for the sake of posterity, it is all the traditions and values needed to ensure they remain safe and profitable. The best way to secure the land is through the study of the Torah and the observance of Shabbat.

Shabbat is the antidote to sacrilege and slavery and is the mainstay of all religious practice on the planet earth.

The Value in Gematria is 11243, גיאבד‎ ‎, will lose gyabed, "slavery to the ravine will end."

v. 8-9: North of Mount Gaash. The Value in Gematria is 7883, זר‎לחג‎ ‎ ‎"A foreigner for the holiday."

Jews are required by the Haggadah to champion the end of slavery in the world and adovocate for the general prosperity of the human race. After the arrest and imprisonment of Donald Trump and the Republican Party, the Russians are our top priority. Their successful liberation from the Kremlin will turn this world back around.

Once the Russian theater is free of tyranny and returned to a state of commonwealth, mankind can focus on getting rid of the problems in the rest of the world in the same manner, from a position of confidence, strength, resolve, and righteousness.

Those Chinese shipyards have to be destroyed and the reign of the Chinese Communist Party has to end. The threats of the Houthis, Hamas, and Hezbollah need to be eliminated.

One by one, governments and cultures that refuse to comply with rule of law must be replaced. This is all entailed in inviting foreigners to the Passover.

v. 10: After that whole generation had been gathered to their ancestors, another generation grew up who knew neither the Lord nor what he had done for Israel.  The Value in Gematria is 8752, חזהב‎ ‎, khazab, "they grew up with the father of falsehood."

v. 11-12: They did evil in the eyes of the Lord. The Value in Gematria is 12062, יבאֶפֶס‎וב‎‎, yabefesov "They bypassed God."

v. 13-14:  In his anger against Israel the Lord gave them into the hands of raiders who plundered them. The Value in Gematria is 8131, חאגא‎, haga, "by arriving and touching."

This does not mean God allowed the Jews to be plundered, it means he sent his prophets to rescue them.

v. 15: They were in great distress.The Value in Gematria is 10681, יוחא, "John", "they transfigured by the Grace of God, they learned how to be gracious."

The verb חנן (hanan) means to be gracious or to favor. Nouns חן (hen), חנינה (hanina), תחנה (tehinna) and תחנון (tahanun) mean favor or grace. Adverb חנם (hinnam) means freely or gratis, and adjective חנון (hannun) means gracious.

All religion boils down to Grace. Grace is the product of great learnedness and a kind temperament, it represents the pinnacle of a human life. Persons in positions of power over the suffering are obligated by rule of law and the sacred tenets of religion to understand how to deliver it and maintain the conditions for its dispersal.

Those Chinese ships are not being made to deliver flowers, nor are the Russians planning to tire of war anytime soon. All misconceptions about the role of Grace in securing our future from these great enemies of mankind and the ones we are homegrowing have to come to an end. Every Jew on earth must play their part.

[lightdancer1]

Today in Women's History Month, the Indian Subcontinent to the arrival of the Muslims:

So why am I starting with the Jains and the Buddhists? Because Hinduism as we know it now is the result of the then-Brahmanic traditions reacting to the rise of evangelical reformist traditions.

The society of the Vedas is a part of the warp and weft of Hinduism but has as much direct correlation to it as the late Roman Empire does to 21st Century European world cultures. Jainism and Buddhism were joined by the Ajivikas, whose fatalism marked a distinct path India could have taken away from the concept of reincarnation and Moksha and all that went with them.

And for a time, under the Mauryas, India did take that path when Indian Emperors made Buddhism the state religion. The Jains are the oldest living rival tradition, Mahavira and Siddartha Gautama were contemporaries, and more rivals than friends, but he was active for at least a decade by the time Siddartha got his own start.

Unlike Hinduism and Buddhism Jainism is the most egalitarian of the three to women and where women's roles are concerned, though like Buddhism it got its start and its appeal from deliberately rejecting the proto-caste structure entirely. Unlike Buddhism it upheld this tradition much further, boosted by the reality that out of all ascetic traditions Jainism has gone furthest down the path.

[stainlesssteellocust]

WIP musing

The existence of both the Antarctican Kings in Yellow and the, uh, actual god Hastur in this fusion raises some awkward questions. Questions that nobody in universe is fully equipped to answer.

The most obvious answer is that the Hali/Vos kings were inspired by or descended from the God and his followers, but the original worldbuilding for them in the canon GA is pretty inspired so it would be a shame to waste it. Aside from Iskr’s proclivities, of course, but I can pick and choose what to cut in my version.

It’s quite possible the South Pole cult were initially their Own Thing, but aspects of the Hastur! KIY bled through via similarity, embroiling itself into their beliefs.

There’s also a suggestion that the giant polar vortex thing (already mentioned in the proto-fic I’ll eventually revisit) might have messed with reality enough that dreams of the Dead Gods are just leaking into Tsalal minds here and there, hence why their entire metacivilisation is Like That, so maybe they were kinda being nudged into a situation where Iskr and his followers Just So Happened to cargo-cult a God.

either way the initial KIYs were almost certainly mundane. But as time went on and all the weird legends about them grew up and people started claiming the whole dynasty was the same immortal guy under the mask…that’s a sign there was some Cult Fuckery going on. Although that doesn’t necessarily mean Hastur cares about them now. Nyarlathotep didn’t take over Cairo this time, after all.

(he didn’t take over London this time either, funnily enough. Britain looks very strange in this AU, and if Fabian is here he is biding his time)

Of course, the remaining Yellow state cult in the modern day (they don’t have a singular King any more) wants absolutely nothing to do with the supernatural being which looks suspiciously like their ritual outfits, for about the same reason an evangelical US megachurch whose pastor has a private jet doesn’t want to meet the Jesus who threw down at the Temple.

They’re happy to let that random Yuropan violinist on the other side of the planet take the heat there, please and thank you.

[eldritchtouched]

For example with “shit getting recontextualized,” The Stand by Stephen King has a Holy Suicide Bombing Human Sacrifice that’s treated as Morally Good, To Kill All the Evil Sinners Who Didn’t Follow Christian/Abrahamic God (there’s some ambiguity there). 

It is obvious this was written pre-9/11 because of the shift in the American zeitgeist post-9/11 surrounding depictions of religiously motivated suicide bombings. Also recontextualizing it was how Stephen King was writing that book during the period of his works when he was blitzed out on cocaine (it’s also why IT has the infamous sewer gangbang scene, same period of time), since his stories usually portray that kind of weird evangelical Christian stuff as really fucked up and villainous. 

It also has a bit of the proto-Christian American Nationalism from the era mixed in at points. To me, it is horror for reasons other than intended (the intended horror being dying of a plague and the idea of a Satan analogue), which makes the issue of intended reading versus text a fascinating discussion in its own right.

(However, the prose in The Stand also sucks and the pacing is a mess, so... yeah, don’t write while on cocaine, or get an editor to actually fix your shit properly if you do.)

[mathsandcomedydotcom]

In ‘Atheist Universe’ (2006), by David Mills, he writes in Chapter 6 that we can either distort Science so as to make it seem to agree with The Book of Genesis—which is what the Young-Earth Creationists do—or we can distort the Book of Genesis so as to make it seem to agree with Science, which is what “non literalists” such as William Lane Craig does with his ‘In Quest of the Historical Adam’ (2021).

Christian Apologetist, William Lane Craig, is not to be commended for proposing a non-literal approach to Genesis, but, is rather to be condemned for distorting both Science and the Critical Study of the Bible so as to advance the bizarre idea that Adam and Eve were actually Homines Heidelbergenses.

As I said before, with this book, Craig has unleashed PhD level misinformation upon the world, in a vain attempt to rescue his terminally declining dying-and-rising-saviour cult, and for this he is to be condemned. (The terminally declining cult, in question, is American Evangelical Christianity.)

Counter-Apologetics is the attempt to counter the fake news, fake history, and fake science spewed forth by Christian Apologists such as William Lane Craig.

Science laughs at William Lane Craig, whereas Christians who actually believe in the historical accuracy of the Genesis account condemn Craig for departing from the Biblical account of Creation. Craig seems to have fallen between two stools with this odiously disingenuous work.

I would love to write a point-by-point refutation of Craig’s book, some day.

As I said before, even though I do not identify as an atheist, nevertheless, I want to read all four New Atheist Gospels by Hitchens, Harris, Dawkins and Dennet.

Social movements fascinate me, whether I agree with them or not. New Atheism is no exception. On the other end of the spectrum, as regards New Atheism, the Social Movement that is Macarthurite Calvinist Extremism also fascinates me.

‘Atheist Universe’ was a New Atheist proto-evangelium of sorts. It was published before the first New Atheist Gospel, ‘The God Delusion’ (2006), by Richard Dawkins, came out.

____

#science #apologetics #secularism #christianity #bible

[stevedonnellyfaith-blog]

Evolution (Post 93) 6-17-15

Some friends of my parents stopped by this week.  They are a fun couple.  He is a folksy, puttering, retired physics teachers who once took my father’s side in a debate with other faculty members about why the lighting fixtures in the dining room were swinging back and forth in time. “Hal’s conjecture is both right and wrong,” Mr. Dorson offered in mediation, “While he is right that this is an earthquake, Hal is wrong about the oscillating motion of the chandeliers. They are stationary; it is the building that is moving back and forth.”  

It is helpful to have a physics teacher around to interpret natural phenomena, but for his wife, a liberal librarian, being married to an ultraconservative who is going deaf can be a trial. I believe she has taken up gardening and visiting museums as a means to deal with the relentless onslaught of Fox News with the volume turned up to eleven. It heartens me to see two people with differing views living together in toleration rather than consternation.  It is easy to see though, who a blaring news or sportscast could upset peace within an American family.

The news doesn’t really interest me much anymore.  Today my mother asked me what I thought of the drama of some felons that had escaped from prison somewhere quite a while ago but hadn’t been caught yet.  Initially, I thought she was talking about the Texas jailbreak from about a decade ago. Come to find out she was talking about a new escape that I had only vaguely heard about accidentally.  I am currently in kind of a news gray-out status with the expectation of placing myself under an out and out cone of silence in the Christmas season once the presidential hi-jinks begin in earnest.  By February every broadcast on every channel will be wall to wall politicians, people who used to be politicians and people who once worked for politicians for the foreseeable future.

While temporal debates are consequential and do impact The Church, I seem to be developing and increasingly lower tolerance for posturing, weasel words, taking others out of context, flamboyant exaggerations and smarminess.  Then once the commercials are over, I can’t stand the news commentators either.  It does seem like whenever Joe Biden blows his nose, Fox News will air alternating Democrat and Republican operatives who will dramatically exaggerate the significance and importance of the color of Joe’s handkerchief.   MSNBC will cover the same story with two Democrat operatives who refer continuously with nauseating condescension to a particular hanky that they both remember Dick Cheney using at one point last decade.  I vaguely remember that there may actually be another cable news channel, or there once was one, but it has become so irrelevant now that it is only watched in airport waiting areas by travelers who have forgotten to pack earphones as protection.  So that pretty much leaves the often biased CSPAN broadcast as my only probable news source. Unfortunately CSPAN is pretty much a consensus pick for the most boring channel not dedicated to auctioning shiny baubles.  So I mostly ignore the political news.

With regard to social issues, my views are mostly insulted on MSNBC and so vociferously agreed with by Sean Hannity that even I begin to question axiomatic beliefs that I have held all my life.  Mostly, I listen to a couple of minutes of Al Kresta on my drive home and compare my own conservative views against whatever Pope Francis has to say.  I try to allow his words to change my heart in a way that my mind can make sense of after the fact. Sometimes his views challenge me, but I am confident that Francis truly believes what he says and that the Pope doesn’t add spin. In general, whenever a Vatican mouthpiece is pontificating for him though, I change the channel as fast as I can.

With respect to matters of the faith, I do buy into whatever Pope Francis has to say lock, stock and barrel, whatever that means. (I search Google for stuff like that all the time and send kind thoughts towards David Katreeb as I’m doing it.)  Anyway, I think, for instance, that the Pope quite reasonably explains the Church position on evolution in a rational way that is consistent with a man who holds a degree in chemistry.  I agree with Francis when he articulates that evolution as a theory is not inconsistent with Church teaching.  God most likely may have chosen to work His design using evolution as a tool to mold the earth until Jesus entered creation in the flesh of a man.  As Supreme Being, He could also have chosen the more unlikely path of creating a whole mess of fossils and bones as a kind of archeological window dressing so that people wouldn’t be forced to believe in Him.  I don’t expect that He would do that, but as a man, I am not a self-appointed umpire of all that He does.  I am also not a competent judge of the intricacies of how other men think creation happened.  My only strong belief is against the neo-Darwinist spin that the theory of evolution proves that God doesn’t exist.  I know God does exist so I try to take a pass on things like hedonism, euthanasia, eugenics and genocide for which atheism provides license.

Here is a metaphor to explain my feelings on how neo-Darwinists extend the evolutionary theory into atheistic excess.  Nicholas, Abby and Natalie were visiting Pam’s parents in Maryland this weekend.  During the visit, Nicholas discovered a record turntable and a nunchaku set in the basement.  He also ran across a Bud Light clock but that is entirely beside the point.  His conjecture that both relics were a cool find is perfectly acceptable.  If Nicholas extended his reasoning to assume that when placed before a karaoke microphone, his grandfather would belt out, Kung Fu Fighting by Carl Douglas, Nick would be pretty far afield.  His grandfather is actually partial to Roy Orbison – the Okinawan fighting sticks belong to Nick’s Uncle Chris.

Anyway, my point isn’t that the neo-Darwinist (Darwin believed in God) atheists have been hitting themselves in the head with sticks too much, even though I don’t agree with their misguided negation of God.  It seems as if we can reasonably believe that dinosaurs became birds or whatever inference paleontologists can reasonably support with evidence.  It doesn’t bother me that no fossil evidence of a missing link between me and Zippy the Chimp.  I’m sure a very low percentage of living troglodytes were actually preserved in shale sandwiches, so I am unconcerned by missing monkey bones.

To me it seems reasonable to believe that proto-evangelical Jesus oversaw evolution; that seems to be what Francis either believes or allows. That interpretation is also consistent with what Jesus has lead me to believe through the Holy Spirit and my discussions with Pam.  It doesn’t bother me when Traditionalists take the Old Testament more literally. To me the Pentateuch doesn’t read as Adam’s, Abraham’s and Moses’ diary any more that the New Testament reads as a Jesus’ memoir.  The Bible provides us with enough information to feed our faith a healthy meal, while still allowing the atheists enough freedom to come to the conclusion that random chance bred herds of allosaurs, then extincted them, while leaving their bone caches so that we can script an increasingly ridiculous Jurassic movie franchise.

Science is wondrous.  Georges LeMaitre, a Belgian Catholic priest used science to formulate the Big Bang Theory which gives us a window or inkling into how God created all of this and all of us.  For those less interested in the beauty of God’s creation, there is also a funny television show by the same name.  God intended us to engage in science so that we can discover more and more about what He has wrought.  Certainly, we will not discover it all, any more than we will find all the dinosaur bones, but what we do find will lead us closer to Him … if we engage in science honestly.

Not everybody follows the scientific method that was originally formulated by the Catholic Church.  Agendas other than truth can warp scientific findings and theories like evolution into false doctrines. Eugenics, for instance, the bastard child of evolutionary thought, lead men to massacre their neighbors.   Whether the corpses were Armenian, Jewish, Cambodian or Tutsi was immaterial, the blood was on the hands of atheists who purported to be using junk science for rationale.  The last century was bulwarked and sandbagged with bodies killed by men liberated from the enslaving belief in a higher power.  In this century the Neo-Darwinists are bringing us contraception and chemically induced gender selective abortion on demand, an abomination that would have horrified Hitler himself because it is double-decimating his master race within the course of several short generations.

For faithful Catholics, let us forgo intramural arguments about monkey DNA.  Because our observations are made of potshard fragments of a complete vase of knowledge, we will never fully understand the entire tableau that God has wrought until we learn everything we desire to know in the fullness of time.  I look forward to answers about Fatima and Lourdes and the Tilma of Guadalupe as well as how exactly the Big Bang was boomed.  With regard to evolution I have one last thought that interests me:  could there indeed be evolution beyond Jesus incarnation?  Also is Jesus’ glorified body an evolution of a different order that we will follow into, leaving our monkey relatives to their banana smoothies? In the meantime, let’s stick together as Catholics and try to sway the thought of those who no longer recognize evil and cruelty for what it is.

[will-o-the-witch]

hello, im having problems where my mom's conservative church keeps being extremely insistent on treating jews like proto-christians and jewish things like stuff that belongs to them too. they do a christianized seder meal every year, which i think is probably very rude, but this year they said that a jewish woman was going to help host it? she's from this charity theyre obsessed with called "jews for jesus". my brain is hurting. im tangled in knots. is this rude or unethical or actually fine or something else?

Jews for Jesus are NOT Jewish. That is NOT a Jewish woman. That is an evangelical Christian PRETENDING to be Jewish as part of a messianic organization that actively receives funding to convert Jews. She is a predator. Throw the whole church away.